{"id":504360,"date":"2026-06-17T13:02:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T13:02:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/504360\/"},"modified":"2026-06-17T13:02:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T13:02:12","slug":"centene-offers-buyouts-to-workers-as-obamacare-enrollment-slides","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/504360\/","title":{"rendered":"Centene offers buyouts to workers as Obamacare enrollment slides"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Centene (CNC<\/a>), a huge health insurer impacted by declining membership in Affordable Care Act plans, is offering buyouts to many of its workers ahead of potential layoffs.<\/p>\n

In an email to staff Monday that was seen by Yahoo Finance, the St. Louis-based company said most employees would be eligible for a voluntary separation program, but would have to decide whether to opt in by July 2. Centene added the company would “lean in and support those team members who are ready to transition to their next chapter via the (Voluntary Separation Program), or who may be impacted by a restructuring in the coming months,” though it did not detail what those restructuring plans entailed.<\/p>\n

The company, which employs 61,000 workers, also did not say exactly how many workers would be eligible for the buyout program, nor how many could be impacted by any possible restructuring.<\/p>\n

“Centene is positioning the company to lead the future of healthcare \u2014 working to deliver a simpler and better experience for our members and partners while meeting the realities of today’s healthcare environment,” a Centene spokesperson said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Bloomberg News, which first reported the Centene buyouts, <\/a>said that the company has already lost about 2 million members in its ACA business this year following the expiration of expanded COVID-era marketplace subsidies. A May analysis from KFF <\/a>estimated that overall marketplace enrollment could tumble to 17.5 million people this year, compared to 22.3 million in 2025, as Americans stare down rising premiums and record-high deductibles.<\/p>\n

Changes to Medicaid could further pressure Centene, which is the country’s largest Medicaid managed care organization, after the One Big Beautiful Bill Act upped eligibility requirements for the government’s healthcare program for the poor and disabled. Roughly 5 million to 10 million people could lose coverage in 2028 thanks to Medicaid work requirements and more frequent eligibility checks, according to the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.<\/a><\/p>\n

Emma Ockerman<\/a> is a reporter covering the economy and labor for Yahoo Finance. You can reach her at emma.ockerman@yahooinc.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Read the latest financial and business news from Yahoo Finance<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Centene (CNC), a huge health insurer impacted by declining membership in Affordable Care Act plans, is offering buyouts…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":504361,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[40635,164161,103,397,396,61,60,215617],"class_list":["post-504360","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-affordable-care-act","tag-centene","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-voluntary-separation-program"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/504360","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=504360"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/504360\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/504361"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=504360"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=504360"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=504360"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}